Author George Orwell once wrote, “Sometimes, the first duty of intelligent men is the restatement of the obvious.”
Someone once asked theologian Charles Ryrie how it was that he taught and wrote with such clarity. – Ryrie answered, ‘The main thing is to always keep the main thing as the main thing’.
Today we come to a text that gives us Paul’s clear answer to what was the main thing for him, and what should be the main thing for every man, woman, boy or girl alive today.
~ Jerry Bridges, “The gospel is not only the most important message in all of history; it is the only essential message in all of history. Yet we allow thousands of professing Christians to live their entire lives without clearly understanding it and experiencing the joy of living by it.”
~ John Stott, “All around us we see Christians and churches relaxing their grasp on the gospel, fumbling it, and in danger of letting it drop from their hands altogether.”
Antioch, HOW do we make sure that doesn’t happen to us? – HOW do YOU make sure you’re not the next mediocre Christian whose life revolves around something other than the gospel? – HOW do we make sure we don’t just become another distracted church that sidelines the gospel (in exchange for 100 other good-but-lesser things)?
*TWO REASONS why the gospel must have 1st place and centre-stage in the church & in everything: